I have a confession to make: I only truly understood the depth of the 2008 real estate crisis about eight years later — around the same time I started experimenting with cryptocurrencies in general. Since my first purchase in 2014, I think I’ve developed a certain skill.

After a little over ten years living in this ecosystem, I can say with absolute certainty that I’ve seen it all — and, listening to fellow colleagues, I can also say that I’ve probably seen very little. If you think about it, that’s almost two five-year periods of watching everything happen, and even more so when we’re talking about an asset as volatile as Bitcoin.

Where I really had to reflect on my actions — part out of necessity, part because it was time — was during the pandemic. In the midst of a global health crisis, with different groups and friends, we made financial, historical, and economic observations that remain important to me to this day.

In my latest interview with Joaquín Morinigo, CEO of CryptoPy, he asked me about central banks’ attitudes toward Bitcoin — which, according to him, has been pretty erratic. Some say yes, some are experimenting, others are seeking deals, and others making it illegal. But that’s a topic for another time.

What I want to do now is revisit my answer to him and give it a different emphasis.

A lot of people have bought into and entered the crypto ecosystem (in general) over the past six months because they were hoping for something grand and glorious with Uncle Donny as Head of State. In other posts, I’ve already recommended that readers avoid falling for the monetary promises of someone whose profession is literally to make promises — whether that's Donald Trump, Bukele, Milei, Lula, or whoever happens to be in power.

The legal treatment of Bitcoin is one of the issues that the IMF is trying to address as soon as possible, because they’ve realized there’s no turning back. People, regardless of their profession or country, choose to adopt Bitcoin (or other cryptocurrencies) because it's cheaper. It's that simple. It can’t be manipulated by centralized planners and, above all, everything is transparent.

Today, we need to understand that the International Monetary Fund is playing the role of watchdog over monetary policies that come from even higher up. If we use the "chicken coop" theory¹, we can see that sitting at the very top isn’t the Federal Reserve, but something even more sinister: the Bank for International Settlements — the de facto central bank of all central banks around the world.

Your duty (and this is my NFA) is to understand that governments around the world have opened their eyes as they watch Bitcoin grow in various institutional portfolios. Suddenly, it seems very attractive to them to relocate their wealth into satoshis.

What will be the impact? We'll have to watch and see. The correct answer will lie in the price discovery that states and institutions give to Bitcoin. And beyond observing this, you must keep stacking sats in self-custody, because — unless you live under a rock — you can clearly see how inflation is eating up the economy, 2 to 4% at a time. Until one day, some suit from a financial institution will come and say, "We’re going to have to devalue the currency." But watch out — it won’t be because of 50 years of financial mismanagement. No, it’ll be your fault, my fault, everyone’s fault — except theirs.

It’s history repeating itself.